Shares of Juniper Networks Inc. rose 1.7% in Monday morning trading after analysts at Oppenheimer upgraded the stock to outperform from perform. The analysts, led by Ittai Kidron, wrote in a note to clients that Amazon.com Inc. weakness appears “temporary.” He added: “Industry checks suggest that recent Amazon weakness isn’t due to a competitive displacement,” Kidron wrote, but rather due to a number of factors such as construction delays at an Amazon data center and a change to the number of switch layers. “While it could take a few more quarters to fully digest, we see improvement” in the second half of 2018, Kidron wrote. He sees tax changes potentially resulting in an additional $100 million in annual free cash flow for the company, which could prompt share buybacks. Juniper shares are up 1.6% over the past 12 months, while the S&P 500 is up 24% in that time.
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